Chapter 13
After dropping Brad off I didn’t drive home directly. I stopped by the grocery shop to get myself some food at the deli counter and drove to the lake. I had my dinner looking at the reflections in the water, with the moon and the sun simultaneously suspended in the brightness of the sky. I wanted to stay there until the sunset, but it was still early. I wished I had Wooster with me, time would have passed by easily throwing rocks in the lake for him to fetch. I hadn’t thought about bathing when I got there and I didn’t have a bathing suit with me. A bath seemed to be perfect though. I took off my shoes and felt the water with my toes. I had a look around and there was nobody in sight, so I stripped off all I was wearing and plunged in the lake. The water was warm and silky around my naked body, and I swam slowly for a while, then let myself float on my back, eyes closed. When I turned on my belly and opened my eyes I saw a figure sitting on the shore, close to where I had left my clothing. I panicked and calculated the distance between where I was and the opposite side of the lake, but then I thought I couldn’t reach home without first getting a hold of my clothing and my car. When I looked more closely I realized the figure I was seeing was a kid. I wondered what she was doing there all alone, since there weren’t any houses nearby, not that I knew of at least.
I checked my watch and noticed that the time was past 8, and I thought the kid should have been home already. I lingered in the water, hoping she would leave soon. But after 15 minutes she was still there and I was getting tired, so I swam back, uncomfortably looking at the little girl staring at me as I moved closer to the shore.
When I was close enough to touch the bottom with my feet I stopped, not knowing what to do. The girl kept observing me, and finally smiled and told me that her name was Mirth. I told her mine before adding that my clothing were right beside her. She looked at them and nodded. It was all very strange, but suddenly it began to feel as if it wasn’t at all, and I climbed out the lake, naked as I was, and started dressing.
“What are you doing all alone here?”, I asked once I finished putting on my clothing.
She told me that she did so whenever her mother was doing a night shift, which happened at least twice a week. “It’s not all that wasn’t safe to go around like this”, I said, and she shrugged and pointed out that I was swimming alone in the lake, naked. I laughed at this. The kid must have been nine or ten but she was sharp in a calm way that made her seem older than her age. I asked if she wanted a ride back home and she shook her head no, saying that her dog would pass by in a while, and they’d go home together.
“But when will your dog come?”, I asked.
“Before it gets dark”, she replied.
I wasn’t too sure about the story and I didn’t want to leave the kid behind, although it was probably true that she had done this many times. She seemed too chill to be lying.
“Well, if you don’t mind I’ll stay here for a while longer to wait for the sunset”, I told her.
We sat there in silence, watching the air burn with the multi-colored passion of the dying day. Then the red ball of the sun sank in the lake and the sky went dark, and the dog was still not there.
“I really don’t think you should walk home alone, it will be very easy for me to drop you off at home”, I told Mirth.
She shook her head no as she had done earlier, and so I sat there, not knowing what to do. But after a while I heard a noise coming from the trees around the lake. Mirth stood up and spread her arms, yelling “Billy!”, and then a dog appeared, trotting happily toward the kid. After greeting Mirth Billy sniffed my feet, and gave me a wag when I touched its head.
“Will you ride us home?”, the kid asked.